


Throw her thirty dollars and return her to the harbor

by kerricker



Category: Imperial Radch Series - Ann Leckie
Genre: (offscreen and in the past), Implied/Referenced Dubious Consent, Other, Referenced Sex Work, seivarden having a terrible day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-30
Updated: 2017-12-30
Packaged: 2019-02-24 00:12:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13201542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kerricker/pseuds/kerricker
Summary: Seivarden was a respected officer once, and now she's a respected officer again, but there was a long space in between. Inevitably, someone someday was going to see Mercy of Kalr Lieutenant Seivarden and recognize the desperate drifter who'd had a very expensive habit and very few marketable skills; she knew that. It didn't make it any easier when it happened.





	Throw her thirty dollars and return her to the harbor

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the prompt "During her time as a druggie, Seivarden was very shrewd and clever and determined to obtain kef in any way she could. So, basically, Seivarden at some point provided sexual favors for people in exchange for drugs or money to buy drugs, and what I want is one or more of the people who participated in such an exchange showing up where Seivarden is at and offering to make another exchange. In front of Breq or Ekalu or both. Just, Seivarden being humiliated in front of someone she cares a lot about."
> 
> Additionally contains Seivarden having some kind of panic attack, mentions of sex Seivarden was in no condition to consent to, and implied sexual abuse on Mercy of Kalr before Breq got there.

"I don't know," Tisarwat said, taking her pastry apart by layers and picking out shreds of fruit, "why everyone always assumes I have ulterior motives for everything. Can I not invite my senior officer for a friendly meal and some delicious tea simply to avail myself of her wisdom and experience?"

"You were doing pretty well until about halfway through that," Seivarden informed her. She had ordered dumplings and wasn't enjoying them much, but damned if she was going to admit she should have taken Tisarwat's recommendation. "Seriously, why are we here? It's a nice enough tea shop, I suppose, but I don't see what you're going out of the way for. Are we spying on a secret den of revolutionary sentiment?" She thought about that. "Counter-revolutionary sentiment."

"It is a very nice tea shop run by people whose political views are entirely tea-based," Tisarwat said as if that guaranteed anything, "and I am here entirely for the pastries, and if you'll excuse me for a moment, Lieutenant Seivarden, I think I see someone I know. Hey! Hey, darling, over here!"

The target of this was a lanky teenager in the uniform of a merchant cadet who had been placing an order at the counter, who was now bubbling over with delight at the recognition. Tisarwat jumped up to greet her with enthusiasm, and Seivarden considered stealing her pastry, but the cadet was trailed by two older officers who were probably more observant, and she ought to make some kind of effort to be a good example.

"Oh, I'm being terribly remiss," Tisarwat said breathlessly, detaching herself from her new limpet friend. "Lieutenant, this is Aveis, off the _Copper Tower_. We met at the concert yesterday, and I've been longing to see her again-" That with an exaggeratedly coy sideways glance that made Aveis dissolve into giggles again. "Aveis, Seivarden, lieutenant of our Amaats." 

"A pleasure," Aveis said cheerfully - any friend of Tisarwat's was a desirable acquaintance in her eyes, apparently - then remembered she had introductions of her own to make. The officers who had been watching this with tolerant amusement turned out to be the captain of Aveis' vessel and one of the fourth mates, who both nodded at Seivarden with as much decorum as you could expect from merchant officers. It struck Seivarden as an odd social combination, but no, on a closer look at the captain, the resemblance was obvious. She wasn't socializing with a teenage cadet, she was chaperoning a baby cousin or niece - or possibly her own daughter, trade families stuck together shipwise - with a petty officer along to run any errands. Perfectly understandable. Seivarden, who felt better to have them placed, gestured at the empty chairs. 

"Have a seat, Captain." You didn't call merchant officers _sir_ , but it was polite to acknowledge their titles. "You've been by Athoek before?" Cargo ships had regular routes, she was pretty sure.

"Not in some years," the captain said, taking a seat. "It's not a regular stop of ours, but all our lines are in a mess, of course. It doesn't seem to have changed much, I must say."

"Very little, administratively or structurally," Tisarwat said brightly, "but we're hoping to make improvements along with the repairs. Have you seen the new gardens yet? Still half scaffolding and notecards on sticks saying _'put the sunflowers here if we can't fit them in by the footpath'_ , but it's really worth seeing-" She was clearly trying to make a good impression, but it would have been obvious no matter what she did, and her approach had a charming artlessness. _Look how young and sweet and enthusiastic I am, I want you to think well of our rebel government because I'm proud of it and excited about it-_ Seivarden couldn't have pulled it off even when she was young and enthusiastic. She wondered if the _Copper Tower_ was carrying something specific Tisarwat wanted, or if this was aimed at the cargo fleets in general, to let them know that Athoek was open for business and reasonably unlikely to explode in the near future.

At any rate, the conversation could get along without much help from Seivarden, whose role was apparently to look adult and respectable and occasionally say things like "Lieutenant Tisarwat is being a little optimistic, but even accounting for delays it shouldn't be more than six months." She leaned back in her chair and sipped her tea and listened to Tisarwat being appealing.

She became aware that the fourth officer was looking at her.

Nothing new, and Seivarden didn't object in principle, but something about the steady thoughtful gaze was making her uncomfortable. Saying something would be even ruder. She focused deliberately on Tisarwat, who was now apparently a beloved family friend and was teasing the captain about allowing Aveis extra leave to attend some theater thing. In the corner of her eye, the fourth mate was still staring at her. She wasn't bad-looking. Close-cropped hair, pale eyes, too much jewelry. Not really Seivarden's type.

The counter bell rang out their number, and the fourth mate got out of her chair. Seivarden, who was closest and not absorbed in conversation about the various considerations of taxing newly-licit mushroom farms, got up to help with the trays. "By the way," she said quietly, "I didn't quite catch your name?" 

She got a sideways glance that went on slightly too long before "It's Cambrie," and then, "You told me your name was Paleikha the first time I met you."

Fuck. "I did, huh."

"You really don't remember?" They were at the counter. Seivarden lined up tea bowls on a tray. She'd known perfectly well that this might happen. That this almost certainly would happen, someday. "There are a couple of years there which I don't remember with any clarity," she said calmly. "If I met you during that time, I'm sure I was no particular credit to my house. Do I owe you money?"

"Nah," Cambrie said, grabbed a plate from her, and set back to the table. Seivarden followed her trying to feel confident, like a respected officer who could account for her own whereabouts for every year of her life. What had that been like? It was hard to remember.

"- _Justice of Toren_ ," the captain was saying as Seivarden set her glass down. "Or should I be saying 'Fleet Captain'?"

"We do," Tisarwat said cheerfully, "but we all met her as Fleet Captain-" more or less- "and it's a habit. If you'd like to meet her," she went on, oozing helpfulness, "you'd be welcome to come to tea this afternoon- we'd love to have you, and you could explain your concerns about the tax code in person, too." The captain was willing, and started discussing her schedule with Aveis. Seivarden leaned back and looked at the ceiling. _Is Breq actually free for tea?_ she sent Tisarwat silently.

_Fuck,_ Tisarwat sent back, smile still fixed in place, _I should probably have checked that, shouldn't I._

_Keep her talking and I'll check with Kalr Five._

_On it,_ Tisarwat said, and stole Seivarden's dumpling.

 

Breq's schedule was flexible, and Kalr Five had mysterious connections among the tea shops. On half an hour's notice they had a private room in a very exclusive teahouse, the kind of place where you sat on cushions on the floor and all the doorways were curtained. Fosyf Denche had probably smarmed her way through shady backroom deals in this same room where now Breq was holding court; what a satisfying thought.

Breq, apprised of the fact that she was holding an informal political salon, had invited several other station officials and Basnaaid Elming. The captain had brought along Cambrie and a different younger relative (and not Aveis, to Tisarwat's obvious disappointment- looked like not all of that flirtation had been strategic), and Seivarden had grabbed two of her Amaats from the central office so their crew wouldn't be too outnumbered, so the room was packed pretty closely for comfortable conversation, but Breq and Kalr Five between them were good at this kind of thing.

Breq, cross-legged on a pillow with a tea bowl cradled in both hands, looked as incongruous as ever. The merchant officers weren't making much effort to hide their curiosity. They responded politely enough to her greeting, though, and Seivarden relaxed a little. In five minutes they were talking pleasantly about the difficulties of having a civil war in the middle of your trade route. People who had talked to Breq for five minutes usually stopped worrying about her being a crazed rogue AI, if only because she'd pointed out ten other things they should already have been more worried about.

Seivarden drank tea with flower petals in it and let herself zone out. Everything was going well. The strangers were warming up to Breq, the minor station officials were clearly pleased to have been invited, Tisarwat had managed to stop politicking long enough to get into animated discussion with Basnaaid about when the garden fountains could be open. Cambrie leaned between them, murmuring an apology, to reach for the napkins. The glow from the lamps lit up her earrings and cast different shadows on her face, and her voice was soft and low, and a light turned on in Seivarden's brain.

She focused her eyes on the petals in the tea in the bowl in her hands. Keep breathing, keep your face still. She breathed in, carefully, and out and in again. Nobody seemed to have noticed anything at all. When she thought she could manage her voice for long enough she looked up and said, "Fleet Captain?"

Breq glanced at her. Breq, of course, could see, but there was nothing Seivarden could do about that, and the people she'd been talking to looked barely curious, so she must have sounded all right. She made that little half-gesture towards your ear that you did to show someone was talking to you privately. "If I might be excused? The Amaats are requesting me."

"Of course, Lieutenant," Breq said, looking at her steadily, nodding. "Now, Captain, if I understand your concerns correctly-"

She made it out of the room without stepping on anyone, praise Amaat for these small mercies which She grants us. In the hallway she picked a direction blindly. There was a washroom and she stumbled into it, leaned over the sink and pressed her forehead against the cold solid mirror. Her pulse was jittering and her breathing sounded wrong and loud in her own ears. "Station," she muttered, "am I having a heart attack?"

_No,_ Station said to her. _But you should go to Medical anyway._

Sure, Medical. They knew her by name in Medical. Maybe she could catch up with that doctor who told her she was lucky the alcohol poisoning hadn't killed her. She _should_ be back in the tea room, helping Breq make connections. She tried to convince herself she could do it. Nothing bad was really happening, so why should there be a problem? There wasn't a problem. Nothing was stopping her from breathing steadily, looking pleasant, making polite conversation, making eye contact with Cambrie - she made a ragged noise and gripped the sides of the sink hard.

Station popped up a warning alert in the lower corner of her vision, and she had half a second to wonder what that was about before Cambrie said "Feeling all right?"

Seivarden hadn't shut the door all the way, and she was leaning in the open frame. "You got out of there in kind of a hurry."

Seivarden tried to look at her, but her vision slid off. She shrugged. "'mfine," she said, which would have been more convincing if she wasn't still leaning on the mirror, maybe. Cambrie slipped inside and nudged the door. 

"Remembered me yet?" She sounded mildly curious. "Guess so," Seivarden muttered, because what difference did it make, really.

"Thought you might." She leaned against the wall with her arms crossed. "You've done pretty well for yourself, huh? Sleeping at the foot of a little warlord's bed must be a dangerous life, but it's sure a step up from how you used to live. Does she know about that, your Breq?" There was a sharp amused lilt to her voice. "Would you like her to hear the details?"

"You can't- are you seriously trying to blackmail me?" Seivarden lifted her head to stare at her. "I've already- you can't possibly make me look worse than I've- Breq knows _everything about me._ "

"Oh, is that how it is?" Cambrie was trying to look superior now, but she didn't have the unconscious arrogance to pull off the effect she clearly wanted. "Maybe not such a step up after all, at least all of my friends were _human-_ "

"Fuck you," Seivarden said. Her throat was painfully constricted and her voice came out of it in a harsh whisper. " _Fuck_ you, you have no right to talk about-"

"Is everything all right, sir?"

Everything was moving too quickly, Seivarden needed it to slow down. Of course the Amaats had checked their private channel and found that nobody had asked for her, why hadn't she realized they would do that? "Just catching up on old times with your lieutenant," Cambrie said pleasantly, turning to Amaat Four in the doorway.

"I didn't realize the Lieutenant was acquainted with you." Four sounded tense and that 'you' had a judgmental edge.

"Oh, I knew her pretty fucking-"

"There's nothing to worry about, Four," Seivarden said, her voice obeying her at last. "I have a few things to discuss with Cambrie, and there's no need for you to stick around. Give my apologies to Fleet Captain Breq for my absence." It all sounded natural and might have been convincing if she wasn't still bent over the sink and shaking. 

"Yeah, Four, shouldn't you be back in there sneering at the rest of us for not having the right uniform?" Cambrie was also trying to look unconcerned, and also failing. "Seivarden and I have plenty to discuss. Maybe we'll go find a motel room to discuss it in. I don't have a lot of money on me, but I'm sure whatever spare change I can dig out of my pockets will suffice, won't it, babe?"

"I don't know," Four said, her voice fast and high, "exactly what you think you're getting at-"

"Oh, I can explain the details if you really want. I'm surprised your whole decade doesn't know personally, dear Seivarden wasn't so very choosy when I knew her. All you had to do was let her finish your drink and she was ready to show how grateful she was in any position you liked. What do you say, babe? There has to be someplace on this forsaken traitor station that sells grain alcohol, or should I get straight to the point and find someone who's dealing-"

"If you think-"

"Four, _please-_ " Seivarden's voice broke. For a moment they were all silent, Four looking stricken, Cambrie breathing hard with hands starting to clench into fists. 

"Anyway," Four said, recovering first and sounding almost normal, "I beg your pardon for my interruption, but I actually came to tell you, officer, that your captain is asking for you."

"Really." Cambrie sounded skeptical. Four shrugged. "I suppose you don't have to go if you don't feel like it. If that's the level of discipline they expect of you in the merchant service."

Cambrie stared at her a moment longer and then wordlessly shoved past her and out the door. 

Silence welled back up. Seivarden tried to keep breathing, but it was hard. She needed to say something. _Sorry you had to hear that sorry I'm a shitty excuse for a commanding officer sorry-_

"Fuck," Four said, and grabbed Seivarden by the sleeve. "Come on, sir, she might come back when she finds out I was lying about that." Seivarden let herself be towed like a child into the hallway. Around the corner was a little room and Four shoved her into it. "Station," she said, hooking the curtain across the door, "if anyone has this room reserved, can you tell them it's infested with, I don't know, venomous hamsters?"

_I do not have problems with vermin, even varieties which actually exist,_ Station said primly. _At any rate, that room was reserved by a couple who had an altercation and left separately after twenty minutes. They paid for a long block, so you should be undisturbed for another two hours. You may wish to avoid sitting on the cushions until they've been cleaned._

"Thanks, Station." Relief was evident in Four's voice. She turned to the shelf where there was a decanter of water. Seivarden gestured _what she said_ and sank to the floor against the wall. Four came over with a glass and Seivarden took it. For a minute they sat in silence while she focused on keeping her hands steady enough to drink.

"I lived with her for a couple of months on a planet out in the Omicron cluster," she said eventually. "I didn't recognize her at first, she's changed her hair and her skin color since then. That and I was high pretty much all the time I knew her. She worked some admin job and she was always bitching that her sister hadn't pulled strings to get her a spacefaring position, so I guess Sis finally came through. I met her at a bar and went home with her, and then just... stayed for a while, you know. Slept on her floor and ate her food, and." She stared at the rim of her water glass. It sparkled and blurred in her vision. She desperately didn't want to cry in front of Four, but her throat was squeezing again and she didn't know if she could stop it. "It's... not very creditable," she said. "For. For an officer's behavior." Her voice caught and squeaked. Why should she be ashamed of crying in front of her soldiers? They'd seen her in worse condition. They knew, all of them, what a disaster she was, what a letdown. Did they whisper among themselves that it was impossible to believe she'd ever held a captain's commission? Seivarden herself could hardly believe that she'd been that person, once. She had commanded a ship and she'd thought she deserved to. The memory felt like detached knowledge of something that had happened to a stranger.

"Things were pretty bad on board, you know, before you and the Fleet Captain arrived," Four said irrelevantly. She scooted closer so they were sitting side by side, three inches of space separating them with propriety. "The old lieutenant, the one you replaced, she was, well. Almost as bad as the old Captain." She refilled Seivarden's water glass. "I mean. You do what you have to, you know."

"I'm glad I could be an improvement at least," Seivarden said hoarsely and then did start crying, helplessly, arms wrapped around her knees and face buried in her arms. Four made an uncomfortable noise and shifted. "You really are," she said quietly. "We all think so. None of us would have the old one back if we could." She bumped her shoulder against Seivarden's briefly. Seivarden tried to acknowledge it and couldn't get the words out. She shuddered and bit her lip, trying to keep quiet. Only children cried noisily.

Was Breq watching this? Probably. Breq and Station talked all the time, Station would show it to her. If she wasn't watching now she would certainly see it later. It couldn't possibly surprise her, or lower her opinion of Seivarden, but it was still painful to think about. She had thought about Breq, sometimes, on the way to Omaugh. Had Breq known? She must have. But she could be oblivious about weird things. Maybe she hadn't noticed that Seivarden was trying to make it clear, there in their cramped little passenger cabin, that she was willing to... not repay her, that would have been impossible, but to acknowledge that she had a debt, that Breq had a right to her. 

She wouldn't be cruel, Seivarden had thought. She would be clear about what she wanted, and you wouldn't have to figure out what sort of reaction she wanted from you or anything. You could just go to your knees and let her fuck your mouth the way she liked it, and do what she told you to do, and it would be all right. She had been ready for it, had lain awake waiting, and Breq had never called her over, and she hadn't understood why. But she hadn't understood a lot of shit back then.

She thought she might be able to trust her voice now. She licked her lips and tried it. "You should probably get back. Hell, I should probably get back."

"You should go to Medical, sir, is what you should do."

"Everyone always wants me to go to Medical. Seriously, you should go back, Breq might need you. I can stay here for a while." She wouldn't contribute much by coming back all hoarse and puffy-eyed.

Four hesitated. "I don't know that I like leaving you alone, sir."

"I'll be fine." Seivarden gestured vaguely upwards. "Station will keep an eye on me. You trust Station, don't you?"

"It did say it was willing to kill us that one time, sir."

"Special circumstances."

_I would have tried to avoid it,_ Station put in.

"See? We're fine." Four still looked a little uncertain, but she left obediently, closing the curtain behind her. Seivarden let herself slump over and pressed her head against the floor. "That really was pretty badass, Station," she added. "I was impressed." Station played a trilling note in response and dimmed the lantern to a comfortable darkness. Seivarden breathed more easily.

 

By the time they departed for Mercy of Kalr she had had a chance to wash her face and was feeling at least presentable enough to be seen. It was still a relief to get onto the shuttle, where Amaats Four and Nine were sleeping and Breq and Tisarwat kept up a quiet conversation, and Seivarden wasn't expected to talk. She fidgeted with the safety strap and tried to get herself into a confident frame of mind. She knew it was possible. She had done it for weeks, falling back on her old habits, running in the groove of confident arrogance as if she'd never stopped being that young captain, serenely certain that her success was an outward sign of shining internal virtue. Being jerked back to reality was freshly painful every time. You'd think she'd get used to it.

Their schedules had come unsynchronized. When the shuttle docked and they were home, Seivarden was just in time for Amaat decade's breakfast. She could have skipped it, told One to handle her duties and gone off to catch up on her sleep, but these were her soldiers, and she had a responsibility.

Four would have caught Nine up afterwards, and the rest of the Amaats had had time to hear some version of the story and speculate about the details Four probably hadn't repeated. So all of them knew, or guessed, or had a pretty good idea. She led morning prayers anyway, at the head of the table where everyone could see her, and then cast the omens for the day. The tokens had been Ekalu's, left behind at her transfer. Seivarden was superstitiously glad about that, like she'd get better predictions for the Amaats with tokens that knew them.

They knew her, too, by now. "-perseverance," she said aloud, leaning over the pattern, reading Ship's cues to interpretation. "We are called to-"

_to keep going,_ the future told her, and _even after the next time you've failed, even if it never gets easier. You've done it before. It's possible to do it again-_

If she focused hard enough, she thought she might be able to believe it. 


End file.
